FOX News Reports on IDA's Campaign to Save Exotic Point Reyes Deer

IDA Bay Area Coordinator Speaks Out Against Extermination Plan in National Television Broadcast

IDA's campaign to prevent the National Park Service (NPS) from killing the magnificent White Fallow and Spotted Axis deer at Point Reyes National Seashore gained national attention recently when FOX News covered the story and broadcast it across the country. The news segment features statements from IDA Bay Area Coordinator Karen Steele, who is spearheading the campaign to save the deer and has organized local activists to leaflet park visitors at Point Reyes. "We're concerned about turning the wonderful Point Reyes National Seashore into a killing field," she states, "and there's no justification for the extermination of these beautiful deer."

The exotic deer have resided at the Point Reyes National Seashore north of San Francisco for more than half a century, having been brought there by a private landowner in 1948. When the area was declared a national park in 1962, Point Reyes became a wildlife refuge, protecting the deer and other species from hunters. Today, about 1,150 exotic deer live peacefully in the park alongside numerous native species. The NPS claims that the deer population must be drastically reduced to restore the park's ecological balance, but their Draft Environmental Impact Statement (FEIS) lacks scientific evidence that the fallow and axis deer are negatively impacting the environment or other species in the park. The NPS plans to manage the deer using a combination of contraception and hunting, but has not yet considered a non-lethal alternative such as contraception alone. Humane methods have proven successful for controlling exponential growth in other protected wilderness areas.

The FOX news story shows that, even though the formal public comment period is closed, animal advocates can still prevent the use of lethal force against the deer if enough people tell the Park Service to pursue a humane solution. The park system belongs to the American people who have hired NPS officials to act as protectors of wildlife. Please help IDA put pressure on the NPS to fulfill their duty to the public and the animals.

What You Can Do:

  1. Visit What You Can Do for information on:
    • Writing letters to the Park Service, elected officials and the media.
    • Helping gather signatures on IDA's Save the Point Reyes Deer petition.
    • Ordering and distributing IDA's Save the Point Reyes Deer flyers.

  2. Click here http://ga0.org/campaign/ptreyesdeer to urge the NPS's Pacific West Regional Director to drop the agency's plan to shoot the deer and instead undertake a feasibility study of using humane methods to manage the exotic deer population at Point Reyes.